park news

Houston swings onto top 10 list of best Texas park systems

Buffalo Bayou Park is one of Houston's most popular parks.

Courtesy of Houston First Corporation

More bragging rights for Houston as a desirable place to live: The city has the No. 8 best park system in Texas this year, a new report says.

The Trust for Public Land's 2025 ParkScore report annually rates park systems in 100 of the largest American cities based on accessibility, equity, acreage, investment, and amenities.

Taking the top spot nationwide is Washington, D.C., for another consecutive year. Rounding out the top five cities with the best park systems are Irvine, California (No. 2); Minneapolis, Minnesota (No. 3); Cincinnati, Ohio (No. 4); and St. Paul, Minnesota (No. 5).

Houston ranked 66th nationally for 2025 in a two-spot improvement after earning No. 68 last year.

The city has an impressive amount of land dedicated to parks, totaling 43,139 acres, or about 12.2 percent of the total city area. The city invests $127 per resident on its acclaimed park system, compared to the national median $133 per resident.

According to Trust for Public Land's website, Houston has more than 700 parks for locals and visitors to enjoy.

“Parks bring people together and deliver enormous physical and mental health benefits for visitors,” said Dr. Carrie Besnette Hauser, the president and CEO of Trust for Public Land. “At a time when so much in our nation seems fractured or polarized, parks may be the last ideology-free zones, where everyone can come together, form meaningful relationships, and enjoy a few hours of peace and relaxation."

The city still has room for improvement when it comes to accessibility, according to the report. About 63 percent of all Houston residents live within a half mile of a park. Nationally, 76 percent of Americans in the 100 most populous cities live within a 10-minute walk of a park on average.

Elsewhere in Texas
Dallas-Fort Worth cities dominated Parkscore's list of the best park systems in Texas for 2025. Plano, a Dallas suburb, ranked No. 1 statewide and 17th nationally this year, followed by Dallas in second place and 34th nationally. Landing in the third and fourth spots statewide are Frisco (No. 37 nationally) and Arlington (No. 46).

Austin rounded out the statewide top five and ranked 54th nationally, and San Antonio ranked behind Austin for No. 57 nationwide.

Here's how other Texas parks ranked nationally in 2025:

No. 65 – El Paso
No. 67 – Garland
No. 72 – Fort Worth
No. 76 – Laredo
No. 77 – Corpus Christi
No. 94 – Lubbock
No. 99 – Irving

parks parkscore report bests lists san antonio

eyes on the road

5 Houston highways rank among deadliest roads in America, per report

Photo courtesy of TXDOT

I-45 is in the hotseat again.

Heads up to Houstonians commuting on the city's freeways: Five busy Harris County highways were just deemed among the deadliest roads in the country, with I-45 in Houston ranking as the deadliest road in Texas. That's according to a new study based on the latest National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) data.

The study, commissioned by Santa Ana, California-based company Future Bail Bonds, compared fatal crash data across 96,000 U.S. roads from 2019-2023. The top 150 "deadliest" roads were ranked by the total number of fatal crashes that occurred during the five-year period.

The No. 1 deadliest road in America is I-15 in San Bernardino County, California, the study found. The interstate, which runs from Southern California to Las Vegas, experienced the highest rate of deadly car crashes from 2019-2023 with 196 crashes.

For comparison, I-45 in Houston had 88 fatal vehicle wrecks during the same time period to rank as the 16th deadliest U.S. road and No. 1 deadliest in Texas. Considering that tens of thousands of people drive the road every day, a fatal crash is relatively unlikely, but the data underscores the need for drivers to remain aware of their surroundings at all times.

The crowded highway stretches from Dallas to Galveston, and the I-45 North Freeway earned its own spot on the list as the 124th deadliest U.S. road. I-45N experienced 44 deadly crashes between 2019 and 2023, the report said. I-45's controversial expansion project between downtown Houston and the north Sam Houston Tollway (and portions of connecting freeways) also earned it a new reputation as a "freeway without a future" by the activist group Congress for the New Urbanism.

Elsewhere in Harris County, I-10 ranked as the 22nd deadliest U.S. highway on the list with 76 fatal crashes during the five-year span. It was dubbed the third most fatal Texas highway, with I-35 in Austin splitting up the two Houston roads as the second deadliest statewide.

"From 2019 to 2023, motor vehicle crashes claimed 186,284 lives across 96,257 roads in the United States, underscoring the persistent danger on American roadways," the report said.

Two more Houston highways ranked much farther down the report, but still remained among the top 150 deadliest U.S. roads: FM 1960 ranked 114th on the list with 45 fatal crashes, and I-610 ranked No. 131 with 43 fatal crashes.

Nine other Texas roads that were deemed the deadliest in America with the highest rates of fatal vehicle crashes from 2019-2023 include:

No. 23 – I-30 in Dallas County (76 crashes)
No. 27 – I-410 in Bexar County (73 crashes)
No. 32 – I-10 in El Paso County (69 crashes)
No. 63 – I-20 in Tarrant County (56 crashes)
No. 66 – I-820 in Tarrant County (55 crashes)
No. 115 – SR-12 in Dallas County (45 crashes)
No. 130 – I-35 in Bexar County (43 crashes)
No. 132 – I-635 in Dallas County (43 crashes)
No. 141 – I-10 in Jefferson County (42 crashes)

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eyes on the road

5 Houston highways rank among deadliest roads in America, per report